Michelle Rodriguez would like to make it clear: She’s not transphobic, and neither is her upcoming film “(Re) Assignment.”
Rodriguez, who caught heat this week over the plot of the film, asserted on Friday that she has nothing but love for the LGBT community and that those who think the movie will disrespect that community should “chill out.”
“I’m bisexual, and I would never in my life do anything that would hurt the LGBT community,” Rodriguez asserted in a video published by TMZ.
Earlier this week, Rodriguez posted a photo of herself in a beard, explaining that the facial hair was for her role in the film.
It wasn’t so much the beard that offended some people, but rather Rodriguez’s plot summary, which described Sigourney Weaver‘s “twisted doctor” character deciding to “take my character’s manhood away with a sex change to teach him a lesson.”
The idea didn’t sit well with some social media dwellers.
“F–k movies where being trans is contrived as ‘punishment’ for characters who do bad s–t,” hissed one detractor in a since-deleted reply to the photo, according to the New York Daily News. “This is f–king nasty. Your way of kicking against the status quo is transphobia, which, surprise, is part of the status quo.”
But as Rodriguez sees it, the film is an action-y, film noir-ish bit of entertainment that means no harm.
“They don’t own the patent on sex changes, and the sex change in the movie is an act of vengeance,” Rodriguez said. “It has nothing to do with somebody’s emotional, psychological journey.”
“I don’t think it’s gonna offend anybody, and they should chill out,” the actress continued.
Watch the video here.